The Magelis range of human machine interfaces (HMIs) from Schneider Electric provides a link between the process, the control system, the operator and the databases used in and around a control system.
Schneider Electric’s Magelis family of HMIs
In 2002 Schneider Electric joined forces with Digital Electronics to collaborate in developing Magelis.
“We simply took the best HMI on the market and superimposed our Ethernet technologies on it, making it even more powerful,” says Sheldon Kaye, high end control product manager at Schneider Electric.
Magelis HMIs
The Magelis range comprises three models:
* XBT GT (Graphic Touch).
* XBT GK (Graphic Keyboard).
* XBT GTW (Graphic Touch Windows).
The XBT GT forms the basis for the entire Magelis range. The industrial HMI offers high picture quality and a wide viewing angle thanks to the TFT screen. From the back there is a selection of communications ports (USB, serial, Ethernet, printer, video input, audio input, audio output, auxiliary terminals and Compact Flash).
USB provides connectivity for peripherals such as printers, barcode readers and keypads. It also allows for fast loading of applications from a PC or direct from a USB flash disk. Fieldbus communication for Profibus DP, DeviceNet, Modbus Plus, Fipway and other protocols is possible through interface cards or USB gateways.
Multiprotocol support allows for serial connection to Schneider Electric equipment and most third party equipment. Compact Flash cards increase the ability to store applications, recipe and history files, images and video sequences up to 1 GB.
The Ethernet port offers:
* 10/100BaseT communications.
* Efficient file transfer via a FTP server.
* Web Gate functionality – allowing authorised users to connect to the HMI using Internet Explorer and to view HMI pages as if they were in front of the HMI.
* HTML navigator functionality.
The combination of available communication ports in conjunction with the 64-bit RISC processor facilitates Multilink communication for simultaneous control on multinetwork architectures.
The XBT GK is the XBT GT with a keyboard. Therefore it has all the power of the XBT GT but the user also has the choice of interfacing with the touch screen and/or the keyboard and mouse.
The XBT GTW bridges the divide between HMIs and IPCs (industrial PCs) bringing a Windows platform to the Magelis range. The XBT GTW allows users to enhance applications under Vijeo Designer, with total access to Microsoft Office software (Excel, Word, and PowerPoint) and Acrobat Reader, which is preinstalled.
Vijeo Designer
Vijeo Designer software leverages the real power of the Magelis.
The software provides:
* Multiwindow display with pop-up management.
* Multilingual support of alphabets such as Byzantine, Cyrillic and Chinese.
* An extended range of 40 character fonts.
* Library with over 4000 customisable images and configurable objects.
* Terminal and programmable controller simulations.
* Alarm and recipe management.
* Historical and realtime trends.
* History management.
“Vijeo Designer is a revolutionary software package that looks and feels like an easy-to-use scada with the ability to log data to the Compact Flash card and display realtime and historical data. I must say that I have difficulty in separating the Magelis HMI from scada systems,” states Kaye.
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